


the way the world works

by queenbaskerville



Series: for my whole crew [2]
Category: Leverage, White Collar
Genre: Alternate Universe, Crimes & Criminals, Dialogue Heavy, Episode: s01e02 The Homecoming Job, F/F, F/M, Flirting, Humor, M/M, Pre-Relationship, Season/Series 01, Team as Family, Theft
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-27
Updated: 2020-07-27
Packaged: 2021-03-06 02:34:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,167
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25555915
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/queenbaskerville/pseuds/queenbaskerville
Summary: "In these uncertain times," Dufort says, "buying a United States congressman is one of the best investments a corporation can make."(When Neal will get to this part during his retelling of the heist for Mozzie, Mozzie will say, "I told you. How many times did I tell you? We live in a capitalist hellscape—")—S1E02: The Homecoming Job.
Relationships: Elizabeth Burke/Peter Burke/Neal Caffrey, Neal Caffrey & Mozzie, Sara Ellis/Alex Hunter
Series: for my whole crew [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1850785
Kudos: 28





	the way the world works

The injured veteran's doctor sends Sara away. Sara can't blame her. She'd probably think this was a scam, too.

"People don't just show up to help," the doctor says. "That's not the way the world works."

Sara thinks of endless hospital visits, treatments that don't work, treatments they couldn't afford. Her daughter, dying. Hope shot down. Doors slammed in her face. A tiny coffin.

_I know,_ Sara doesn't say. I remember. _That's why I'm here._

Sara waits until the doctor is gone to make a phone call.

"Elizabeth?" she says. "Call them."

(Alex sits alone in a room with wonderful lighting, painting an abstract of what seems to be a woman covered in soap suds. "She can't live with the lies and the filth," she murmurs to herself. "She wants to be clean. There's—a metaphor for sin, yes, that's it." She paints another stroke. Her phone rings. She puts down the brush to answer it. "Oh," she says. "Hello. When?" She hangs up when she gets her answer. She adds one last stroke to the painting. "She killed her first husband," she proclaims, sounding victorious. Alex doesn't sign the painting because it's still drying, but as she leaves, she walks past another painting signed _Maxine Webster_.)

(In a parking lot in Berlin, Peter Burke throws two unconscious men across the hood of a car, and the third and final man pulls a gun on him. Peter looks unimpressed. A phone rings. "That you or me?" he says. "Could be important. Does your mother have your number?" When the man looks down for his phone, Peter grabs the gun, punches him in the neck, unloads the gun, and chucks it aside. He answers his ringing phone. "Yeah?" he says. "Nothing, why?")

(Neal, dressed in a moving van uniform, hauls a statue-sized crate onto a dolly and starts wheeling it past a few curious-looking people in the museum, nodding a polite goodbye at a security guard as he goes. He loads it into a truck and straps it down to some things. Neal walks over to the front of the truck and gets in the passenger seat. "What time is it?" the driver says. "Hold on," Neal says, pulling out his phone. "It's—oh, I have a missed call from Elizabeth." The driver says, "You can call her on the road. Now, what _time_ is it? We've got to go!")

* * *

Neal, Peter, and Alex arrive at the building Elizabeth told them about at the same time, and they take the elevator up together. Peter must be in a good mood, since not only is he willingly making small talk with them, but he even initiates it. Neal resists the urge to yank his chain. 

They exit the elevator to the uppermost floor just as Peter's asking them about what they did with their money.

"From the first job?" Neal says.

"Yeah," Peter says.

"I put all that money in a Swiss bank account," Neal says.

"Millions of dollars," Peter says, "and you didn't buy anything?"

For all his appreciation of the finer things in life, Neal's smart about his finances; he knows the importance of having several safety nets. But he's not going to get into that with Peter. 

"I like money," Neal says.

"I bought a little retirement home," Alex says.

"Nice," Peter says.

"In Dubai," she says. "And Tokyo."

"What about you, Peter?" Neal says.

"Yeah, I'm not about to tell two known thieves what I did with a multi-million dollar payout."

"Don't you trust us?" Neal says teasingly.

"I plead the fifth," Peter says.

(No and yes would each be incriminating in their own ways. Peter tries very hard not to think about which of them—no or yes—is his real answer.)

They reach a door that has a small envelope taped to the front of it. ALEX is written on the front of it in Elizabeth's handwriting. Alex takes a key out of the envelope and unlocks the door. They open it to a luxurious-looking office space with LEVERAGE CONSULTING AND ASSOCIATES emblazoned on the wall in front of them.

Peter whistles with admiration.

"What is all this?" Alex says, but her delighted smile makes it known that she's already starting to guess the answer.

"Hey!" Elizabeth comes around the corner with a laptop in hand. "About time. This is our new cover story!" she says. "Welcome to Leverage Consulting and Associates, founded in 1913 by the great Katherine Leverage III."

She gestures to a large painting mounted on the wall of—of Sara Ellis, if she was around sixty years old.

"Did you paint that?" Peter asks her incredulously.

"I did," Neal says.

Peter wonders _when_ , exactly, Neal had painted that—had he somehow had enough time to get that thing done and have it delivered between getting the phone call and coming here? Really?

Alex's delighted smile has grown, and she looks like she's barely holding back laughter. 

"Sara is going to _kill_ you," Alex says.

"It's a terrible misogynistic notion that women should try to stay young forever," Neal says. "What's this if not proof that Sara will be just as powerful and respectable as she ages?"

Sara Ellis's fake ancestor gazes down at them regally.

"It's weird," Peter says.

"Now, Leverage Consulting Inc. is squeaky clean," Elizabeth says, "with all corporate taxes on record as being paid for the last ninety years."

Elizabeth gives each of them a new cell phone and a dossier.

"All your identities are as partners. Your payroll taxes are paid," she says. "You guys have pension plans and dental. Those are employment records, case files, and company newsletters."

Neal glances over his file. He takes out his phone and sends a quick text. 

_**NC:** Guess what? In 1998, I won the sack race at the 4th of July picnic. XOXO_

He gets a response almost immediately. 

_**M:** WTH._

_**M:** Is this code for something?_

_**M:** A distress signal?_

_**M:** Give me something to work with here. _

Neal sends a picture of his file, along with a smiley face.

_**M:** EM is very thorough. I’m impressed. _

_**NC:** You’d like her. _

_**M:** So you’ve said. _

_**M:** Forgive me if I’m still not ready to subject myself to the mercy of SE._

"Elizabeth, I can't believe you spent your share of the money on this," Alex says.

"Actually, Sara paid for this with some of her share," Elizabeth says, "before she gave the rest of it away."

"What, all of it?" Peter says.

"Yeah, to a children's hospital or something," Elizabeth says. "Here are your offices! You can bring something like a photo to personalize it a bit, make it more believable—you know what, you should bring plants! I'm a big supporter of calla lilies."

Elizabeth’s own office already has a few houseplants in it already, as well as some (unlit) scented candles. There’s a stock photo framed on her desk of a shaggy dog that she has taken to calling Satchmo in her head. She has an elaborate backstory for him prepared if anyone asks. (She gets bored. Sue her.)

When they reach the conference room, Elizabeth allows them all the appropriate length of quiet to gaze in awe at their conference table and the wall of television screens.

"Photo and video forensics programs, back doors into every electronic banking system in the world, running heuristic data crawls all over the news sites to find our clients—oh, also!" she says. "Facial recognition database tied into CIA, NSA, and the FBI. But the real piece de resistance—" she pushes a button or two on the remote, and the display changes to a baseball game. "DirectTV HD Total Sports package."

_Product placement,_ Alex thinks to herself.

"NFL, NBA," Elizabeth says, "and I threw in a little bit of baseball for you, Peter."

Peter looks at her with complete adoration. Neal has had a similarly enamored look on his face the entire time she's been talking.

Sara opens the door to the conference room and strides in with a martini in one hand and a flash drive in the other.

"Alright, alright," she says. "Stop kicking the tires. Want to take her for a spin?"

* * *

"Let me make this clear," Peter says. "This is a private army you're talking about taking on. Because it's definitely Castleman who shot them up, not 'insurgents.'"

He talks more about what to expect from Castleman and then explains the difference between the type of gunfire that would've been used if Castleman's story was true versus the type of gunfire they heard in the video.

"You ID'd the weapon from the gunshot sound?" Neal says.

"It has a very distinctive sound," Peter says.

* * *

"This will never hold up in court," Peter says.

"That's why the corporal is lucky he doesn't have lawyers," Sara says. "He has thieves."

Her team sufficiently pleased by this, Sara signals for them to get to work. As they leave, they walk past a portrait of—

Sara does a double-take.

"Caffrey!" she shouts.

* * *

On the roof of Castleman Headquarters, Neal helps Elizabeth with her rappelling gear.

"You know, Neal," Elizabeth says, "I just remembered something. I should go back to the office."

"Hmm?" Neal says.

"Gravity," Elizabeth says. "I just remembered gravity."

"Elizabeth," Neal says, "I designed this rig myself. The line is carbon fiber. Five-point harness. Weight support here—" he ghosts his hand over her sternum— "and here—" another faint brush of his hand— "and here."

Elizabeth shivers.

"Auto-breaking resistance on the main pulley back here," he finishes.

"Okay," Elizabeth says. "Okay, alright, cool. So it's tested?"

"Well," Neal says, and then Elizabeth starts to freak out again.

"It's not tested?" Elizabeth says. "Why the hell haven't you tested it?"

"Elizabeth," Neal says.

"Don't 'Elizabeth' me!" she says.

"We're going together," Neal says. "I've got you. Do you trust me?"

"I—"

"Do you trust me?" Neal says again.

He holds her gaze. She wavers.

"I don't really have another choice, do I?" she says.

"Nothing that would be convenient," Neal admits.

She huffs a laugh.

"Fine," she says. "But you're going to have to push me."

Neal pauses, visibly thrown for a loop.

"Seriously?” he says. “You _want_ me to push you off a roof?”

"I'm not going to be able to jump myself," Elizabeth says. "It's too high up. I can't do it."

"You can," Neal says. "Here. What if we hold hands? If you close your eyes, it's like we're jumping into a swimming pool."

"Oh, God," Elizabeth says. "Okay. Alright. Let's go for a swim, then."

* * *

"You know the great thing about congressmen?" DuFort says. "Fifty, a hundred grand well-spent will get one elected, but then once they're in, the incumbency rate is over ninety-five percent. You can get an average eighteen, twenty years' use out of one of them. In these uncertain times, buying a United States congressman is one of the best investments a corporation can make."

(When Neal will get to this part during his retelling of the heist for Mozzie, Mozzie will say, "I _told_ you. How many times did I tell you? We live in a capitalist hellscape—")

* * *

"Sara, get him clear," Peter says. "I can't find—"

The doctor who stops him is wearing crocs. The two beefy doctors he just walked past were wearing heavy-duty black boots, and they've disappeared down the corridor.

They're going to kill Corporal Perry, and they won't leave witnesses alive. They won't leave Sara and Alex alive. Sara and Alex, bruised and bloody, snapped necks, defensive wounds—or a bullet each between the eyes, if they're using guns, if they're trying to make it look like Perry killed himself, like it's a murder-suicide—Sara and Alex, dead on the ground—

Peter _runs_.

* * *

"Look, playtime is over, Sara," Peter says. His voice comes out harsher than he'd meant it to, but he can't quite banish the vision of what would've happened if he hadn't made it there on time. He reigns himself in as he explains what he learned in the fight at the hospital. "These guys are ex-marines. They're not messing around."

“You ID’d a guy by his knife fighting style?” Elizabeth says. 

“It’s a very distinctive style,” Peter says.

Sara should've expected them to panic, after their reactions to Dubenich trying to kill them. They've already proven that their first instinct is to cut and run when things get too hot. Why would it be different this time?

Well. Sara won't let them.

"I didn't sign up for this," Elizabeth says. "What I did before, nobody got hurt."

"I stole paintings for a living," Alex says.

"I never hurt anybody," Neal says.

"I, uh," Peter looks embarrassed. "I actually hurt people, so..."

_No,_ Sara thinks. _You don’t get to bail on me now. Not after everything._

"You know, you all called on me," Sara interrupts. "You remember?” she says. “You begged me to run the crew, agreed to play by my rules. Now walk out if you have a problem with that," she challenges them. "Walk out any day if you have a problem with that. It's simple."

There's a long pause.

"We finish this one," Peter says.

"Just one," Alex says.

"How do we hit him?" Elizabeth says, and that's that.

Under the table, Neal sends a quick text. If he's going to see this through—if he's up against a fucking private military contractor, and he's not running—then he's serious about staying. God help him, he is. 

_**N:** So, about subjecting yourself to the mercy of SE..._

* * *

Sara stops abruptly at the sight of a short balding man talking half a mile a minute to Peter and Elizabeth. Elizabeth looks baffled, possibly on the verge of delighted. Peter looks horrified.

"I called in the cavalry," Neal says.

"Who is that?" Sara says.

"Well, he _was_ my insurance policy in case you held a grudge about the Raphael," Neal says, "but you didn’t screw me over, so. Now he's part of the team."

Sara listens to a little more of what the guy is saying and turns to Neal with an incredulous look.

"He's insane," Sara says.

"We're a package deal," Neal says firmly.

“You’ve worked alone for the past four years,” Sara says. 

“That’s what they say,” Neal says with a shrug.

Sara gives him a searching look. Neal doesn't back down.

(It doesn't escape her that Neal's trusting her with knowing the face of a man whose existence is so secret that not a single government agency Sara ever dealt with in all her time chasing Neal had record or rumor of him.)

"Sara!" Elizabeth says. "Do we get to keep this guy?"

"For now," Sara says without breaking eye contact with Neal. "He's getting a trial run."

Neal grins.

"Hey, Mozzie," Neal calls out, "how do you feel about stealing money from an arm of the military industrial complex?"

"I feel like it's Christmas come early," Mozzie says. "When do we start?"

* * *

Neal and Alex head to DC—Alex chats up their marks; Neal waltzes into a chamber of congress.

Elizabeth and Mozzie have become friends alarmingly quickly, in Sara's opinion, but that's what happens when you put two spyware-obsessed gadget people in a room together and let them loose against the government. Sara picks at a bowl of popcorn while the three of them watch Neal on the monitors. He carries the modified bill up to the drop box.

"Break a law—everybody and their mother has done that," Elizabeth says. "But steal a law?"

"Neal's going to be a legend," Mozzie says with unabashed pride.

"The eagle has landed," Neal says into the comms. Another one of Mozzie's bird codes—Neal can't help but grin as he says it.

* * *

"How was Washington?" Sara asks when they get back.

"Villains, conmen, wolves in sheeps' clothing," Alex says. "Felt right at home."

* * *

They're rapidly approaching the finish line. Everyone has their orders: Elizabeth, Peter, and Neal go together to get the shipping container open. Sara waits in the car with a laptop, monitoring the situation. Mozzie and Alex are in the backseat, waiting for the right moment to distract the Castleman security.

Elizabeth and Peter keep watch while Neal picks the lock on the container.

"What do you think is in there?" Elizabeth wonders.

"Artifacts from Baghdad museums?" Neal guesses. "Maybe some from the Saddam palaces?"

(If it is, Neal's going to figure out a way to pocket a few and see if it's possible to return them. He's not such a big fan of theft when it's part of brutalizing a country's culture.)

"No, I bet it's weapons," Peter says. "Lot of back alley arms dealing going on in a war zone."

Neal finishes picking the lock. Elizabeth and Peter do the honors of opening the doors, revealing—cash. Wall to wall cash.

"Oh," Elizabeth says, slightly overwhelmed. "Money's good, too."

Neal approaches the money reverently. He turns around to look at Peter and Elizabeth, leans back against the densely-packed cash, and lets a delighted grin spread across his face.

"You look like a thirteen-year-old who just found dirty magazines under his parents' bed," Peter says.

"This is better," Neal breathes. "So, so much better."

* * *

Mozzie and Alex play the role of "rich couple who've gotten off their cruise and are furious because they're lost and can't find their car" almost too well. If Sara didn't know better, she'd think they've worked together before.

"She's only with me for my money, you know," Mozzie complains to one of the Castleman men, before Elizabeth and Peter's device attached to the shipping container goes off.

* * *

Neal protests and blusters the appropriate amount for a truck driver who might have something to hide, stalling for the precise amount of time that they need to get the congressman and Dufort in place. This has the effect of making Aimes—Patrick Aimes, the Castleman contractor in charge of security at the dock, Elizabeth has done her research—very, very irritated.

"Open that door," Aimes says, putting the muzzle of his gun under Neal's chin, "or I open your head."

Peter, listening through the comms, grinds his teeth in order to keep from snarling. Elizabeth gently lays a hand on his arm. Peter takes it as the restraint it's meant to be, but Elizabeth is just as angry at the threat; if Neal ends this day with so much as a hair out of place, she and Mozzie will ruin that man's life.

"Alright, sir, of course," Neal says. "I'll open it right away."

* * *

When they've delivered the money to the hospital, they linger to watch the doctor and the veterans really take in what that amount of money is going to mean for them.

"Anyone who wants to walk away can do it right now," Sara says.

There's a brief silence.

"One more," Peter says.

"Maybe two," Elizabeth says.

This is the way Sara’s world works now: she has people, and she helps people. 

It doesn’t get much better than that. 


End file.
